[reviews] afe100cd
logoplasm: testa piena d'orche

Ambition and the voice of the dreamer: a supernatural, yet linear experience.

Plenty of reasons to celebrate this album. First off, it is the 100th release on Italian Afe Records and comes in a slightly more luxurious "triple folder cardboard sleeve", opening up into psychedelic graphic deformations of the hippy-esque cover motive. It also marks the comeback of Paolo Ippoliti and Laura Lovreglio to the limelight (if that is the right word for a release limited to a mere 100 copies) after having retreated into private musings for most of the past few years. And if that wasn't enough, there is yet another argument to feel festive: they have returned in style.

The reactions of more or less well-known colleagues in the comment section of the Logoplasm MySpace account shows that despite their obscure status there have actually been people anxiously anticipating this record. "Can't wait to hear your latest release." Mathieu Ruhlmann confesses, while Marcus Obst of German project Dronaement remarks: "Your 'Attimo in un warmhole' release is really a big thing!!!".

By this, he is referring to the sister release to "Testa piena d'orche", which can be freely downloaded from the site of weblabel Ctrl+Alt+Canc. With its form of a single piece in roughly 35 minutes and focus on drones and field recordings, it shares more than just a few stylistic similarities – if one of them is to your liking, you'll need both.

Laura and Paolo have spent large portions of the new millenium cramming their HardDrives with the most diverse and sometimes bizarre noises and displayed the dedication and love of a messy stuffing his appartment with lost and found objects from the street. Composing is therefore an act of creating fertile oases of order inside a blooming garden of chaos or a head full of killerwhales respectively, which would be the direct translation of the record's title.

For a work made up of so many disparate elements, "Testa piena d'orche" has turned out a pretty linear affair, moving seemlessly and effortlessly through three different segments. Starting with a tender two-tone motive over a prolonged light-pad, the piece builds into a melange of drones, screetching and fantastic noises, then flows into a relaxed state of summerly musique concrete and askew guitar pluckings, whch releases itself in a suspenseful thunderstorm.

The advice of listening to this album on the highest possible volume is well spent, as it wants to be enjoyed as a supernatural experience, not a classical composition, nor as an intellectual or conceptual work. As such, "Testa" would make for a great album to test 5.1. surround systems with. You really feel like pouring yourself a glass of cool rose wine in the warm middle section and as the lightning strikes in the grand finale, you crouch in your sofa to protect yourself from these violent forces of nature.

The greatest achievment, however, is that the band has managed to build a half-hour long work which never looses its ease. If you listen closely, you will hear the ambition, just as much as the voice of the dreamer.

You can clap your hands now.

[Tobias Fischer]